Thursday, April 28, 2011

WikiLeaks Had Best Year For Donations In 2010

By Jerry Smith Apr 28 2011
assangewatch.blogspot.com

The Wau Holland Foundation, a German nonprofit organization that processes most of the donations given to WikiLeaks, has released a report detailing what they received in donations for WikiLeaks, and how the donated money was spent.

The foundation said that they received about $1.9 million in donations in 2010 for WikiLeaks, with about $700,000 being donated in December.
On November 28th, WikiLeaks began releasing it's cache of embarrassing U.S. diplomatic cables, and on Dec 4th, PayPal refused to do business with them anymore, claiming that WikiLeaks had violated it's terms of service.

Visa and Mastercard decided to cut ties to WikiLeaks on December 7th and Bank of America started blocking transfers to WikiLeaks on December 18th.

Chart, from the report, showing the month to month breakdown of the PayPal donations WikiLeaks received:

Chart, from the report, showing bank transfer donations, by month, that WikiLeaks received:

April was also a large month for donations, as shown in the charts. In April, WikiLeaks published the 'Collateral Murder' video.

The classified Afghanistan war documents, released in July and the Iraqi war logs released in October, did not increase the donations to WikiLeaks like the video and diplomatic cables did.

Chart, from the report, showing the breakdown of donations by country:

With the breakdown showing that 34% of their donations came in from the United States, WikiLeaks tweeted:

The main proportion of donations for WikiLeaks are from the USA (pdf) http://is.gd/HSyyaW
http://wikileaks.ch/support.html

The Wau Holland Foundation gave about $585,000 of the total amount donated to WikiLeaks, to the website so that they could cover their expenses.

"Costs in this domain are produced by reviewing and editing incoming material, video authoring, analysing and arranging a large number of documents by subject and priority, anonymisation and much more. This also includes the involvement of external experts like journalists."

Travel Expenses: WikiLeaks paid out about $91,000

"Travel costs result from the participation of conferences, meetings, lectures, meetings with press representatives and those responsible for the infrastructure. WikiLeaks-activists were paid travel costs in exchange for receipts, generally economy class tickets for flights and second class tickets for public transport as well as hotel costs at average price category. Often the latter was not necessary, because activists often are logged in private."

Legal Advice: WikiLeaks paid out about $48,000

"Legal advice costs were reimbursed for project campaigns, though not for individual-related legal advice or legal representation in court proceedings. Costs arise by campaign consulting (before and after) and in case of threatening legal conflicts."

Remunerations: WikiLeaks paid out about $150,000

"Only a few heads of projects and activists were regularly remunerated based on invoices. The amount of remunerations assigned is based on the remuneration scheme of Greenpeace."

In January of this year WikiLeaks made a $15,100 contribution to Bradley Manning's defense fund. This does not show up in the report as the report only covers 2010, and the contribution to Manning was this year.

Manning is the U.S. soldier accused of leaking the embarrassing diplomatic cables, the classified documents about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and the 'Collateral Murder' video to WikiLeaks.

Manning is currently facing over 30 charges, the most serious being 'aiding the enemy'. If he is found guilty of 'aiding the enemy', Manning could spend the rest of his life behind bars or get the death penalty.

Manning, who is currently being held at Quantico Marine Corps Base in Virginia, in solitary confinement, spending 23 hours a day in a windowless 6-by-12-foot cell, shackled and forced to sleep either naked or in a suicide-proof smock due to supposed fears that he may commit suicide, will be transferred soon to a Joint Regional Correctional Facility at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

Assange, who is still under house arrest at Ellingham Hall in Norfolk, Britain, will continue to fight being extradited to Sweden at a two day hearing at the High Court in London on July 12 and 13.

Assange has been fighting extradition to Sweden where he has not been charged with anything but is wanted for questioning by the Swedish police about accusations of rape and sexual molestation made against him by Sofia Wilen and Anna Ardin. Assange denies the allegations and says he had consensual sex with the two women.

Assange and his lawyers fear that if he is extradited to Sweden he may then be extradited to the United States, where he could face torture, confinement at Guantanamo Bay, both, or even the death penalty.

Assange angered the United States when the leaked embarrassing diplomatic cables, the classified documents about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and the 'Collateral Murder' video were published.